


Pride and Prejudice and Superheroes

by FabulaRasa



Category: DCU
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-31
Updated: 2014-01-31
Packaged: 2018-01-10 16:45:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,424
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1162102
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FabulaRasa/pseuds/FabulaRasa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clark sees something he wasn't intended to see, in the Watchtower's locker room.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pride and Prejudice and Superheroes

"There are just. . . some things I don't understand here," Clark said. That was an understatement. His head was reeling. He felt almost literally dizzy with it. "It's like if someone told me you were dating Miley Cyrus. I just can't. . . process it."

Bruce made another snorting noise and continued to type up the reports he was working on. Clark tried to get a read on his face, but the cowl was still up. "Do you mind if I ask how long?" 

"Why?" It was the only thing Bruce had said all evening. The only thing he had said, really, since Clark had burst into the Cave and confronted him with. . . what he had seen. The thing he had seen and couldn't unsee. Bruce and. . . Hal Jordan. Of all people, Hal Jordan. Not naked or doing anything gross. Maybe it was all the more disturbing because it wasn't explicit. Just standing too close in the locker room at the Watchtower, and Clark had thought, that's strange, I wonder if they're fighting about something? So he had moved quickly closer, and then—then. Bruce had grabbed the Green Lantern's uniform and pulled him in, and. Well. 

Meanwhile, Bruce was looking at him.

"What do you mean, _why_?" Clark said. "Why am I wondering how long you two have been. . . together?"

"Yes."

"Because it's—I don't know! Bruce, are you _serious_? Are you really _serious_ here? Lantern has never been anything to you but—but disrespectful, and, and rude, and—when has he ever shown the slightest—I just don't understand." And he sat down heavily on a stack of file boxes. He put his chin in his hands.

"Not to mention you never said anything to me about being. . . you know," he added. 

That got Bruce's attention, because his chair swiveled. "Being what," he said flatly.

"Gay," Clark said. "As your friend, it would have been nice to feel that you trusted me with that information."

Bruce looked at him. For a minute Clark thought he was going to say something, but then he just gave another snort and turned back to his keyboard. "Is it because of me," Clark said, after a while. Bruce stopped typing. His voice this time sounded not irritated, just puzzled.

"Because of you?"

"Because of me, and. . . Diana. We've never really talked about that. Were you. . . angry with me in some way?"

Bruce pushed the cowl back. So at least he had had that much success—at least he got to see Bruce's face. But looking at the expression on Bruce's face, it didn't feel that much like victory. "Angry with you," he said. "You thought I was angry with you. Clark, please explain to me what the hell my personal life has to do with your dating Diana?"

"Well," Clark tried. _Because now that I know you're gay I'm wondering if maybe you were secretly in love with me and I just missed it_ did not seem like the sort of thing he ought to be saying here. He was pretty sure there was some sort of blowtorch or other flame-throwing device within easy reach of Bruce, and he wouldn't bet it hadn't been calibrated to sear Kryptonian skin. "Okay, that was—never mind. That was dumb. But you—I mean, it's just sex, right?"

He was beginning to wish Bruce had left the cowl in place. Those eyes were boring right through him, and the expression in them was. . . uncomfortable. "Look," he tried again. "I'm not judging. I can see that. We're all human—well more or less. We're all in need of just. . . some human moments, occasionally. Right?"

Bruce was still just looking at him. "You want me to tell you I'm having meaningless sex."

"Well. . . I don't want you to tell me anything. I'm just asking. I guess I'm just assuming. You. . . I mean, Bruce, come on, let's be honest. You hate him. You loathe and despise Hal Jordan."

Bruce's hand was doing that thing it did when he was thinking, the thumb and forefinger rubbing together. "Do I," he said. 

"Um, yes? Come on, Bruce, face it. You're overworked, overstressed, and overtired. In that situation, you're bound to let your body make decisions it shouldn't."

Bruce was stripping off his gauntlets, carefully, one at a time. He was laying them on his thighs and smoothing them thoughtfully. "You saw me kiss Hal in the locker room," he said. "And you assumed that I was a, having meaningless sex and b, not in control of my libido."

"Well—"

"You wouldn't have made those assumptions if I'd been kissing Black Canary, for instance. If I'd been kissing Canary, right now you would probably be asking me how long I had had these feelings, and what our plans were, and when we first noticed how we felt about each other, and about a million other annoying and inane questions, but I'm guessing none of those questions would be Bruce, why can't you keep your cock in your pants, you faggot."

The last word cracked like a whip in the cave's slight echo. Clark stilled even his breathing, because it turned out Bruce hadn't needed the flamethrower. His eyes were crackling, though he hadn't moved. "Bruce," Clark whispered. "That isn't what I—"

"Get your homophobic ass out of my cave."

Clark stood, all his limbs stiff. His lips felt numb. _Please forgive me_ was the only thing he could think. Bruce had never spoken to him like this before, and he would do anything if he could wipe that look off Bruce's cold face. But if he didn't obey Bruce now, there wouldn't be anything left of their friendship to piece back together. He swallowed, and kept his head down, and departed with heavy footfall the way he had come, his chest a frozen block of sadness and self-reproach that weighed him down as he flew away from the Manor, and the memory of Bruce's eyes.

* * *

He rested his forehead in his hand, and kept it there. He stared at the floor, and the small slick of moisture from a nearby stalactite's drip. He didn't turn around at the sound of the pulse, and there was indeed a sound to it, though Hal wouldn't believe it if he told him. He could hear it, a low distinctive hum, just slightly within human register. The sound was warm, if sounds could be said to have temperature.

"Another truly awesome day, I see." 

Bruce didn't move, and the glow subsided as Hal's feet touched the floor. And then the glow brushed his shoulder—that, too, he could feel—and slid down his arm. "That bad, huh," he said softly. Bruce shut his eyes. He didn't have to ask, and was unsurprised when he was pushed gently back in the chair, and Hal straddled him, enfolded him. 

"Never mind," he said, "Green Lantern's here to save the day. You just listen to your neighborhood space cop, he'll solve all your troubles."

The glow was quenched, but Bruce could still feel the warmth radiating up his body—up his thighs, up his hands. There was a brush of lips against his cheekbone. "Hey," Hal whispered. "Come back to me."

Bruce stroked Hal's thigh, the taut glorious stretch of muscle. For a minute he contemplated standing and pushing Hal onto that console, just stripping their clothes off and fucking him until neither of them could remember their names. They were good at that. There was no end to the things he could forget, in Hal's body. 

"You knew Clark saw us, earlier today."

"I did."

"You didn't say anything."

"Nope."

"You wanted him to see."

"Yep."

"That wasn't your decision to make."

"Oh," Hal said. "Like maybe I should have waited for you to have your super earnest convo with him, where you told him all about us, and maybe shared cute pics on your phone of the two of us at Pinkberry. I bet that was gonna happen next week, right?"

Bruce tipped his head against the back of the chair. Hal was fiddling with his hair, flattening the parts mussed by the cowl. "Went that well, huh," Hal said, his voice softer. Bruce just snorted.

"Whatever. He'll come around. He's just pissed. I'm guessing the two of you just had a huge fight, or whatever a huge fight looks like for the two of you—lots of jutting jaws and sullen glares, maybe a thrusting chest or two. He'll get over it. You'll get over it."

"You think so," Bruce said. 

"I know so. Honestly, Bats, you can't afford to be alienating one of the few people willing to speak to you on a regular basis. Whatever the big guy said, he didn't mean it. Don't brood on it. Though I realize that's like telling you not to breathe."

"It was. . . a disappointing conversation."

"You've got some pretty unreasonable expectations of people, I ever tell you that?"

"Like my expectation that one day, you'll learn to hang up your towel after a shower?"

"Like that one, for instance."

"He said I hated you."

"Ah." Hal rubbed at Bruce's arms, his shoulders. "Well, far be it from me to point out he wasn't wrong. You did hate me."

"I never hated you."

"Well, I sure as hell hated _you_ , I remember that all right."

Bruce pulled him down for a kiss—a bit open-mouthed, a bit lazy and less than neat. God, he loved Hal's tongue. He loved the things it could do. Hal's tongue could make him come, without anything else. Hal's tongue could unstring him and put him back together again. "In cases such as these," Bruce murmured, "a good memory is unpardonable."

His allusion earned him a slow cockeyed grin. "That private school education," Hal said. "It's going to get you seriously laid some day."

"That's what I'm counting on."

"You realize this means I'm Darcy."

"Like hell are you Darcy."

He could feel his cock stirring to life beneath the weight of Hal's body. They could do it right here in the chair, Hal straddling him, except he wanted to flip positions, because he needed to get fucked tonight. Needed Hal in him. With barely perceptible motions, they were grinding against each other. He knew Hal was getting hard for him, too. He loved to throw Hal on a bed and pull his shorts down and watch the length of him thicken and rise. He loved to lick him until Hal was shaking with small shivery motions and trying not to come. 

He ran his hands up Hal's back, down to his ass, up his back again. Hal's eyes had gone treacherously solemn, the way they sometimes did. "Let's go to bed," Hal said.

"It's nine o'clock."

"So? I hear this is when normals go to bed. We could pretend to be normal. It'd be kinky."

"Mm. The last thing you need, Jordan, is another kink." He used his hand on the back of Hal's neck to pull him down again, and the kiss meant business this time. He was starting to regret leaving his cup on, because things were getting uncomfortable. Hal lifted lightly off him. 

"Come on," he said, tugging at Bruce's hand. Bruce let himself be led—not upstairs, but to the Cave's bedroom. It was their preferred place: dark, private, removed. For no one but them. They stopped on the way for more kissing. Hal was unbuckling his armor, because that was what Hal did, in every possible way. Hal had always seen right through it, or rather, refused to acknowledge its existence. His entire life was a Maginot Line that Hal gleefully marched around, every single time. 

"You'll call Clark in the morning," Hal murmured against his ear.

Bruce grunted, but he knew Hal knew it was assent. He told Hal what to do all the time, and nine-tenths of the time Hal ignored him. Hal told him what to do once in a blue moon, and Bruce did it, without question. 

"So speaking of kink," Hal said. "I may or may not have a Regency ruffled shirt I want you to wear."

"No."

"Okay then, just the boots?"

" _No_."

"Riding crop?"

"N-we'll see." 

"And can I call you dearest, loveliest Elizabeth? Or maybe just Lizzie?" 

Bruce gave him a hard shove the rest of the way to the bedroom, and sternly suppressed his own smile.

* * *

From his quiet vantage point at the Cave's back entrance, Clark waited. He had made it halfway to Metropolis before he couldn't stand it. It was just that he had replayed every word he had said, and every word Bruce had said—that especially—and he had known there was no way on God's green earth he was going to sleep tonight if he didn't come back here and at least try again. 

If he didn't say, _Bruce, every word you said to me was deserved._

If he didn't say, _Bruce, I'm sorry I failed you._

If he didn't say, _Please give me another chance, and I won't fail you. I won't fail you because for the last six months, every time I have wanted to give up on being with Diana, every time things got too hard, you were the one who put me back together again and shoved me back in the ring. You were the one who knew the right thing to say, or when not to say anything at all. You have been nothing but supportive to me, and the second I had a chance to be just as supportive for you, I blew it._

_Because I was hurt._

_Because I was petty._

_Because I was jealous._

He should have cleared his throat or made some noise or done something to indicate he was there. He shouldn't have watched, when Hal came in. But somehow he couldn't look away. Couldn't look away from Bruce's face, and the way everything on it relaxed, eased, softened when Hal touched him. Couldn't look away from the way he looked at Hal. Couldn't look away from how beautiful they were, twined about each other, chestnut hair against black.

He would slip out as quietly as he had come in, and he would text Bruce—a text he wouldn't see for some time, from the looks of it—and tell him. . . well, some of those things. None of those things. He would hope that _I'm a jerk, I'm so sorry_ covered most of those things. 

And he should really look into who this Darcy was they were talking about.


End file.
